As darkness falls tonight, millions of extraordinary creatures emerge from their daytime hiding places to dance in the lamplight, navigate by moonbeams, and pollinate flowers under the cover of night. Welcome to National Moth Week 2025—a global celebration that transforms our relationship with one of nature’s most underappreciated yet vital groups of insects.
The Hidden Giants of Biodiversity
While butterflies capture our attention during daylight hours, moths quietly dominate the nighttime landscape with staggering diversity. Scientists estimate there are at minimum 150,000 moth species, and some believe that there could be over 500,000! To put this in perspective, there are 10 moths for every butterfly, making them one of Earth’s most diverse animal groups.
These nocturnal marvels come in every imaginable size and pattern. Moths have been found that are small as a pinhead and as large as an adult-human’s hand, with the atlas moth boasting an impressive 12-inch wingspan. But of course, it’s the incredibly complicated wing colors and patterns that make them especially dazzling.
More Than Beautiful: Ecological Powerhouses
Far from being mere curiosities, moths serve as crucial ecosystem engineers. Moths are abundant and ubiquitous in vegetated terrestrial environments and are pollinators, important herbivores of wild plants, and food for birds, bats and rodents. For example, nocturnal moths can be more species diverse than day-active pollinators in agroecosystems and many serve as key pollinators for diverse wild plants, while others that act primarily as agricultural pests have been found to constitute about 75% of the diet of local bats.
Moths represent a substantial component of the insect biomass available to insectivorous vertebrates, both as caterpillars and adults, and are an important dietary source for many animals, most notably bats and songbirds. Their ecological importance extends even further—they are the very fabric underlying the species-rich radiations of parasitoids in the Chalcidoidea, Ichneumonoidea, and Tachinidae, which collectively make up much of the planet’s metazoan species diversity.
A Global Movement Born from Local Passion
National Moth Week (NMW) is a worldwide citizen science project that shines a spotlight on moths and biodiversity. The initiative began humbly in 2012, growing out of local summer “Moth Nights” organized since 2005 by the Friends of the East Brunswick (New Jersey, USA) Environmental Commission, a nonprofit organization dedicated to local environmental education and conservation.
What started as a local effort quickly became a global phenomenon. In its first year, National Moth Week became an international phenomenon, attracting participants from 30 countries, who registered more than 300 event locations. Today, the event spans 80 countries where National Moth Week events are celebrated and continues to grow each year.
Why July? Perfect Timing for Discovery
Mid-summer is a good time for finding moths in most of the northern hemisphere. We decided to keep the time period consistent from year to year to help organizations plan their activities in advance. Observing moths every year during the same period optimizes data collection and analysis over time.
Join the Adventure: How to Participate
The beauty of National Moth Week lies in its accessibility—anyone, anywhere can become a citizen scientist. All you need to attract moths is an outdoor light and a surface for the moths to rest on! The light on your porch can be your mothing setup, or you can buy specific lights to attract them.
Getting Started Is Simple:
- Set Up Your Light: Use any outdoor light source, though UV bulbs or mercury vapor lights attract more species
- Create a Viewing Surface: A white sheet or light-colored wall works perfectly
- Document Your Discoveries: Once you’ve found a moth you can take a photo with your phone and submit the photo to any of our partner apps or websites. They can help identify and log the submission automatically.
- Register Your Event: The most important thing you should do is register your event! Not only you will be taking part of a global citizen science project, but you will also be entered to win prizes, such as books and posters!
Participation Options Include:
- Host a public or private moth night
- Observe moths in your backyard or local park
- Submit your observations to global biodiversity platforms
- Engage your school, library, or organization in a fun educational event
Contributing to Real Science
Your moth observations contribute to meaningful scientific research. These contributions help researchers study moth diversity, distribution, and ecology worldwide! Through partnerships with major online biological data depositories, National Moth Week participants can help map moth distribution and provide needed information on other life history aspects around the globe.
This citizen science approach proves invaluable for understanding biodiversity patterns. Most countries lack sufficient data on the distribution and abundance of moth species. In countries where long-term monitoring data do exist, however, moth biodiversity appears to be on the decline. Your contributions help fill these critical knowledge gaps.
Conservation Urgency
Unfortunately, many moth species face increasing pressures. There is an alarming record of decreases in moth abundance and diversity from across Europe, with rates varying markedly among and within regions. Likely causes of these declines include agricultural intensification, light pollution, climate change, and urbanization.
Depletion of moths will have effects that will cascade, upward and downward, triggering further losses of interactions and species. This makes citizen science monitoring more important than ever—your observations help scientists track these changes and develop conservation strategies.
Amazing Moth Facts to Share
- A male moth can smell a female moth from 7 miles away
- The hawkmoth can fly at speeds of 33.7 mph, making it one of the world’s fastest flying insects
- In some African countries, 90% of people eat moths according to a 2004 United Nations survey
- The royal walnut moth has a maximum wingspan of 6 inches
Educational Opportunities Abound
Moth walls present an opportunity to engage youth to discover the seemingly endless diversity of colour, shapes, and forms of insects and how those relate to their numerous roles in nature while exposing them to science via a fun outdoor activity. Whether you’re a parent, teacher, or nature enthusiast, National Moth Week offers countless opportunities to inspire the next generation of naturalists and conservationists.
Get Involved Today
Visit www.nationalmothweek.org to register your event – it’s free and helps us track participation worldwide. Whether you’re planning a solo backyard exploration or organizing a community event, your participation matters.
National Moth Week 2025, remember that every moth photographed, every observation shared, and every person inspired contributes to our understanding and appreciation of these remarkable creatures. National Moth Week literally shines a much-needed spotlight on moths and their ecological importance as well as their biodiversity.
Tonight, when you see a moth fluttering around your porch light, take a moment to appreciate the incredible diversity, ecological importance, and sheer wonder of these nocturnal neighbors. You might just discover that the night holds more magic than you ever imagined.
Ready to start mothing? Grab your camera, step outside, and join thousands of citizen scientists around the world in celebrating the spectacular diversity of moths. The night is full of discoveries waiting to happen.